Tag: game of thrones

It was back to Stadium:MK for what many people believe to be the last Collectormania in MK. To be honest, I’m kinda glad. Personally, I don’t think the stadium is suitable. For the first time in a while I had my brother and his family with me. He is disabled and had great difficulty in getting around and with the photoshoots upstairs he was even more put off.

Whilst I managed to see a few guests and get some signatures on my various canvases, for me, the most fun was had watching my niece and nephews in costume. My nephew Charlie was dressed as Darth Vader, and once he had the mask on he thought he ruled the place. Even England footballer Jack Charlton had to get out of his way. My niece Jessica was dressed as Elsa and loved seeing the other Frozen cosplayers. Little Lewis was dressed as Captain America and flatly refused to have his photo taken with a rather attractive Agent Carter cosplayer. Will have to teach him!!

The rain, the building works and the incompetence of Stadium:MK staff led to a not so pleasant time for my brother and the family. CM:MK needs a rethink!

At the end of January, Sky Atlantic announced that the Game of Thrones travelling exhibition would finally be coming to London for 8 days in February, but tickets would only be available to Sky customers. I managed to get tickets after a major hiccup with the Sky website.

On Tuesday 17th February, myself and my friends Mags, Suvi and Martin headed off for the O2 by boat. It was a good experience, but I’m glad it was free as I wouldn’t pay for something that brief.

The main part of the exhibition consisted of viewing a variety of props and costumes of main characters in season 4 of the show. There were a few interactive opportunities, including being burnt to death by a dragon, being turned into a white walker and climbing the wall (this was so busy that we passed it by….over an hours wait). There were also a couple of chances to sit in the Iron Throne and have your photo taken.

I finally decided to go and visit my friends Paul and Kerry in Belfast. We had a very busy week but being that we are all big GoT fans we decided to do a few Thrones based activities.

The first thing we did was visit Castle Ward which was used for the set of Winterfell in Season One. We paid for an archery experience which was an hour long and was led by the guy who was the archery advisor for the first season. We donned costumes (original HBO leftovers I might add) and spent an hour hearing anecdotes and shooting recurve and longbows. The session ended with a bit of sword play and mock beheadings. We made sure we took plenty of photos!

Later in the week we decided to visit a few places used in filming, including The Dark Hedges which was used as The Kingsroad in season one, Ballintoy Harbour which doubled as Pyke Harbour on The Iron Islands and a quick swing by the GoT studios in Belfast.

Last con of the year for me and a quieter event compared to the madness of the summer one.

As normal lots of costumes on display and I again helped with the charity stall for our Starfleet Chapter, the USS Iceni.

It was a chance for me to get a few more names on my Game of Thrones canvas and to meet Alan Ruck who played (among others) Captain John Harriman of the Starship Enterprise-B in Star Trek Generations…..such a friendly guy!